New Player: Deck-building Advice

Recommended Posts

After over a year of investigating and longing glances, I finally broke down and bought the reprint edition of the core set about two weeks ago. I tried playing through the first scenario with one of the pre-made decks, and this game is certainly challenging! What's your advice for new players for deck-building strategies for keeping the darkness at bay?

Share this post

Link to post

Share on other sites

Don't be afraid to netdeck on Ringsdb. You can filter your deck search by card set on the search tab of the decklists tab. There are a plethora of blogs and youtube channels (and two podcasts) about the game, so I highly recommend checking them out.

It will be very challenging to win at first, but it'll come. Also, don't expect to win with the pre-built decks in the core set. They just won't make the cut. After you've played with each of them to get a good feel for the different cards, start deckbuilding. Expect to have a lot of trouble with the second quest, and to not beat the third for a good long while.

Share this post

Link to post

Share on other sites

Welcome to the game! I remember the first time I played Passage Through Mirkwood with one of the core set decks--it was terrible! It was a long time before I was able to move on to Journey Down the Anduin, and I've still only beat Escape From Dol Guldur a few times. (Never solo-playing!) Here are some specific strategies and reminders that are absolutely essential for tackling the game as a beginner with a limited card pool:

-Keep your threat low for the first few rounds of Journey Down the Anduin, long enough to draw a Forest Snare. That's one of the only viable ways of dealing with the Hill Troll, working with the Core Set cards.

-NEVER play Tactics mono-sphere. There's only a total of 4 Willpower in all of the Tactics heroes and allies in the Core Set. The temptation to go all-out monster-killing is tough to resist, but without multiple decks, mono-sphere Tactics is a notorious nightmare.

-Probably for Journey Down the Anduin and DEFINITELY with Escape From Dol Guldur, play with either another player, or, if that isn't an option, play with multiple decks.The core set in itself doesn't come with near enough cards to use any full strategy playing with the preset decks, so it's always best to combine some of the spheres.

-If you get beat over and over again on any of the quests, don't give up. I remember wanting to sell the game when I first got it. I'm so glad now that I didn't.

I hope you have some luck and enjoy questing! LotR LCG has been one of my favorite FFG games.

Share this post

Link to post

Share on other sites

Welcome to the game! I definitely concur with all of the above recommendations. Ringsdb is a fantastic tool because it can filter your searches and allow to to build decks based on your own collection. It won’t taunt you with what you don’t have if you take advantage of those features!

I’d also recommend Authraw’s series Path Less Traveled on his blog if you get to the point where you are considering expanding.